


The Treasures of Earth

by kyrilu



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Case Fic, Family Secrets, Gen, M/M, Murder Mystery, POV Outsider, Pre-Canon, Treasure Hunting
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-26
Updated: 2017-07-26
Packaged: 2018-12-07 11:09:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11622309
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kyrilu/pseuds/kyrilu
Summary: A treasure is rumored to be hidden in a manor at the edge of Godric's Hollow. With the reluctant assistance of local historian Bathilda Bagshot, Mr. Leonard Holliwell endeavors to find it. Soon, Mr. Holliwell is founded dead, all his research notes stolen.Or: Albus, Aberforth, Ariana, and Gellert become involved in a Victorian murder mystery.





	The Treasures of Earth

**Author's Note:**

> I'm writer's blocked on this fic, but I hope I'll get around to finishing it eventually (I know who the murderer is, so).
> 
> I got the idea after reading Wilkie Collins' The Moonstone, but my brain hurt trying to write in epistolary format so this is more Agatha Christie-ish.

> _ Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. _
> 
> _ -Matthew 6: 19-20 _

* * *

 

Jael Eglantine could hear the periculids crackling in the garden.

Periculids were very strange flowers, but they were her mother’s favorites. Without even glancing out the window, she could imagine them now: red and fiery, lighting like fireflies in the darkness.

She resumed writing at the parchment on her desk.

_ Darling, _

_ I miss you and hope that those old fools at the Wizengamot are not too tiresome. Say hullo to Ethel for me, if you please. I miss her frightfully. _

_ Mother remains sickly and pale, and she still refuses to see a Healer. I worry about her constantly, though at least she is no worse. _

_ Father rarely leaves his rooms, for he is caught up in his research. He seems rather gloomy and bleak and he gets into awful rows with Emory (most of the time, it is certainly my blockheaded brother’s fault). Yet sometimes I catch sight of the old father, how he used to be, when he smiles at me. _

_ Oh! I think I should like to return home--back in London in our cosy house, you and me and our little cat. Even if it means being away again from Mother again. There is something cold about this place, not in the meaning that I want thicker robes or stronger warming charms but that it is silent and strange. _

_ It is very like my father to move into a place like this. Eligius Manor at the edge of Godric’s Hollow. Who knows what mysteries he may unearth?  _

_ Your loving wife, _

_ Jael _

In her looping, precise handwriting, Jael wrote ETHAN EGLANTINE on the outside of an envelope. She would post it by owl tomorrow morning, when the family owl returned.

For a few moments, she thought only of her husband. She had met him at a society event two years ago (it feels so long ago!), and they had married after several weeks of courting.

Darling, charming Ethan. He called her  _ mon ange _ , even though she didn’t think she looked like one, for she wasn’t angelically fair like her mother but dark like her father. Yet Jael had her mother’s blue eyes and delicate pale features, and she had a bright and happy laugh.

It was uncharacteristic of her to be worried - but this place! This house!

Unhappily, she found her mind turning over several matters, concerned about her family...

* * *

 

Superintendent Auror Octavius Gull’s breakfast was interrupted by the tip-tapping of an owl at the window.

Once he read the letter, his face became grave. He was already a rather serious man--everything neat and orderly about him, from his dark combed hair to his yellow-black robes--but something in him seemed to sharpen.

He was the embodiment of what his profession entailed. He was a sleuthhound, a niffler of a man, his eyes awake and alert.

Immediately, he went to the Floo and disappeared in a flash of green. When he emerged from the fireplace on the other end, there was an Auror waiting for him.

“Superintendent Gull,” said the Auror, in greeting. 

“Inspector Rozen, I presume?”

Rozen nodded. “Thank you for coming, sir. Didn’t want anyone from the Ministry here, thought you could help.”

“Of course,” Gull said smoothly. Ministry Aurors from London were always the bane of local Auror forces. High-handed fellows, butting into investigations and taking credit. “Your letter said that a historian has been killed last night.”

“Yes,” Rozen said, glancing down at the sheaves of parchment at his desk. “Leonard Holliwell down at Eligius Manor. He and his family moved in last year. Mr. Holliwell studied the village--the old manor house in particular.”

“And it was murder, all right?”

“Nothing can be fully determined yet,” Rozen said, carefully. “But our Healer says that it was. Mr. Holliwell ingested a large amount of a toxic substance and it was too much to be a mere accident.”

A poisoning--now that was a change. Not the undetectable silence of a Killing Curse, or the brutal slash of a Cutting Curse.

What an interesting character this killer may be, thought Gull.

“Suicide?” Gull asked out loud.

“No note,” Rozen said. “And while his relatives say that he’s been in a dark mood of late, they stress that he oughtn’t have taken his own life now. The way he was found attests to an intentional poisoning by someone other than him. I can show you at the manor.”

Gull nodded. “What type of poisoning was it? A potion mixed into his tea or some such?”

“Ah,” Rozen said, “and there’s the problem, sir. The daughter found her father when he was dying. Quick-thinking girl--with the help of a stable boy, she immediately extracted a bezoar from a goat’s stomach and forced it down Mr. Holliwell’s throat. It was too late, unfortunately.”

“And the bezoar reacted oddly with the poison,” Gull murmured. Yes, he had seen cases like this before. “It makes it difficult for Healers to detect exactly what poison was administered.”

“Just so, sir.”

“We shall go to the manor, then,” Gull said. He paused. “Tell me, do you mind if I indulge in a fancy of mine? I wonder...I wager that we might need a hand in this case.”

“Whatever you think has to be done to solve this case.”

“A Divination sensitive,” Gull said. “I’d rather it be someone local. I trust their instincts over some Department of Mysteries hack.”

Rozen started. It was an ancient tradition, roping in a village Seer type into your cases, though of course the Ministry of Magic was supposedly modernizing the practice these days.

The Aurors who subscribed to Divination crime theory were either mad codgers or cutting edge eccentric magic scientists.

What category did Octavius Gull fall in? Rozen thought. He’d never had the chance to do anything like that--his wand and his instincts were enough--but one never knew.

“We can ask round the village,” Rozen said.

And that was that.

* * *

 

Ira Rozen had lived in Godric’s Hollow his whole life.

Born here, bred here, went to Hogwarts (Hufflepuff, decent OWLs, Quidditch Chaser), then came back. He learned his trade from the local Aurors at the time, not the Ministry program in London.

So Rozen knew the village well. And to his knowledge, nobody ran a Seer business down in Godric’s Hollow--you had to get a permit for that--but maybe there had to be someone he missed.

The first person you should ask would be Bathilda Bagshot, who knew the other villagers thoroughly. Rozen had been meaning to question her about Leonard Holliwell, because she had been collaborating with the deceased, and he decided to knock out two Beaters with a single Bludger.

At the ring of her doorbell, Professor Bagshot emerged, looking extremely distressed as she ushered them into her sitting room.

“It’s terrible!” she exclaimed. “Terrible!”

News had evidently spread around the village by this point.

“Aberforth told me,” Professor Bagshot said. “Poor Leonard! It’s such a tragedy for the family…” She had a dazed, far away look in her eyes, then she noticed the newcomer.

Octavius Gull extended his hand. “Hullo,” he said warmly. “I’m Superintendent Auror Octavius Gull, Professor Bagshot. I’m here to help young Rozen here on his investigation.”

Professor Bagshot seized his hand and shook it in a sharp perfunctory manner. “Pleased to meet you, sir. What can I do for you--for both of you?”

“First of all,” said Gull, “I have a rather--unusual--request that Rozen said you might be able to help me with.”

“Oh?”

“Are you aware of any Seers in Godric’s Hollow? True Seers?”

“Why,” Professor Bagshot said in astonishment, “my grandnephew just arrived this morning and I’ve heard he has the gift. You can ask him. Are you modernizing your Auror techniques, Mr. Rozen?”

“That we are,” Rozen said, flustered. “Er--how old is he? Not too young for a case like this, is he?”

“A case like this,” Professor Bagshot repeated. “Surely you don’t mean this is because Leonard was--killed on purpose? I thought, perhaps, an accident.”

“It may be, it mayn’t,” Gull said. “We have to explore every possibility, Professor Bagshot.”

“I,” said a firm, accented voice, “am sixteen, sirs. I am willing to assist your investigation.”

There was a boy standing on the top of the staircase. Wild shoulder-length blond hair, blue-eyed, angular features. When he walked downstairs, it was almost as if he floated--his golden hair and white dress shirt sleeves swaying as he moved.

“Gellert Grindelwald,” said the boy. “I am a four on the Render-Lange Test.”

There was an intense curiosity in his blue eyes. It made Rozen shift uncomfortably for some reason he couldn’t fathom.

Gull was satisfied. He’d only worked with one four before in his life; the others were twos or threes. 

“You’ll do,” Gull said. “Come down to the manor with us. Heard what happened?”

“My aunt told me,” Gellert said. “The neighbor boy came by this morning--I wasn’t there to see him, because I was still sleeping (the time change in this country, you see).”

He looked vexed at having missed the opportunity.

“The stable boy, Aberforth Dumbledore,” Rozen said, for Gull’s benefit. “He comes by the manor often to care for the horses and goats. That sort of thing.”

Gull said: “And it was he who helped Miss Holliwell extract the bezoar?”

“Mrs. Eglantine,” Bagshot corrected. “She’s married to some half-French chap who clerks for members of the Wizengamot. And, yes, Aberforth’s got himself a gentle hand when it comes to animals; it pained him having to cut open that little goat’s stomach.”

“Surely the shock of his employer’s death was a factor?” Gull said, blinking.

“Ah, Aberforth’s been through his fair share of troubles,” Professor Bagshot said. “I daresay he turns his attention to animals instead of people to lessen the burden.”

Gellert scoffed. “Sounds like a foolish boy.”

Bagshot shot her nephew a remonstrating glare that he ignored.

Rozen cleared his throat. “Professor, before we leave for the manor with your nephew, we were wondering if we could also ask you questions about what you know of the deceased. When and how did you meet him?”

“April of last year,” Bagshot said. “Right when he moved in. Leonard said that he read several of my articles and wanted introductions to the villagers for a project of his. He was rather invested in the queer rumors about the manor.”

“Rumors?” said Gull. “What rumors?”

“They are very romantic rumors,” Bagshot said. “Old village lore says that hidden treasure is buried in Eligius Manor.”

“Yes,” Rozen said, slowly. “Some wizards and witches have said there’s treasure left by Godric Gryffindor or Bowman Wright. But they’re just stories…”

“They weren’t stories to Leonard. He was enthralled by them,” Bagshot said. “You know how men are. Wizards fighting goblins over treasure. Fountains of youth and caves of riches. Map and legends and impossible artifacts.”

(Bagshot’s nephew made a funny little noise.) 

“I don’t mean to speak ill of the dead at all,” Bagshot continued severely. “There is significant historical significance in tales like those. They should be duly recorded--but I don’t believe they’re real. That was the reason why I haven’t spoken to him in several months, because Leonard was focused on finding the purported treasure.”

“When did you last see him?”

“Sometime around Christmas,” Bagshot said. “We kept in touch through owling after that. It’s his son who’s down in the village often, although I see their maid at the greengrocer’s.”

“Mrs. Holliwell doesn’t come down?”

“That woman is eternally bedridden,” Bagshot said. Her mouth twisted in consternation. “I’ve met her once, while visiting Leonard to talk about his project. She’s a proper lady, of course, but we’re not intimates.”

“This buried treasure business,” Gull said, abruptly, “do you think Mr. Holliwell could have been killed because of it?”

“Of course not, because the treasure doesn’t  _ exist, _ ” Bagshot returned promptly. “I think you fellows may be making assumptions too soon. Perhaps he drank a medicinal potion intended for his wife. He could be rather absent-minded. Poor, poor Leonard.” 

“So you don’t think he had any enemies.”

“Not at all.”

When Rozen and Gull got up to leave, Gellert Grindelwald in tow, Bagshot suddenly stopped them.

“You should go next door,” she said. “Where Aberforth lives. I believe Emory might be there today, as well.”

Visiting the village so soon after his father’s death? Gull thought. One would think Emory Holliwell would be in the manor with his sister and mother.

* * *

 

Emory Holliwell was painting. He was a young man, perhaps around five and twenty years.

Every brush stroke had the weight of careful deliberation. He stood in front of his canvas and applied gloomy greys and blues and browns.

There was a young golden haired girl who stood in the garden behind the Dumbledore cottage, clutching a book in her hands. Not smiling, but very still and silent.

“I already told Inspector Rozen what happened last night,” a boy was saying, a tad churlish. “I promised that I’d be at the inquest. You should go; my sister doesn’t like strangers--”

“What’s her name?” Gull said lightly. She was a pretty girl. She’d probably be very beautiful when she got older.

“Ariana,” the boy said. Firmly, he said, “Please leave.”

Gellert scowled. “Who do you think you are, ordering around Aurors?”

“I don’t expect  _ you’re _ an Auror,” said Aberforth Dumbledore. “Who’re you? No, you’re Professor Bagshot’s foreigner nephew she mentioned, aren’t you?”

“Yes. And I have certain abilities that the Aurors have taken an interest in, stable boy,” Gellert said loftily.

Aberforth reddened. He looked like he was about to challenge Gellert to a duel right then and there.

Gull felt himself beginning to regret recruiting a Seer.

Rozen stepped in. “Boys,” he said sharply. “There’s been a death. Possibly a  _ murder. _ The situation calls for acting like gentlemen. Like grown wizards.”

“Murder?” Aberforth said. “I don’t know anything like that. I thought Mr. Holliwell caught the same sickness Mrs. Holliwell has. I didn’t get quite a good look at him.”

“Bezoars are specifically for poisons,” Gull reminded him.

Aberforth shrugged, uninterested in the finer details.

“What’s your account of what happened?” Gull said.

“Nothing complicated about it,” Aberforth said shortly. “I tended to the animals around eight o’clock like I usually do. Checking for sickness--ensuring Lionel and Laura’s new kids were doing well--making sure the horse who’d got his hoof punctured was healing all right.

“Then Mrs. Eglantine Apparated to the stables around half eight and said she needed a bezoar.”

“I heard from Professor Bagshot that you’ve a soft spot for animals,” Gull said sympathetically.

“It was Lionel we ended cutting the bezoar out of,” Aberforth muttered. He looked embarrassed, but also genuinely stricken. “Didn’t do much good for Mr. Holliwell.”

“Were you there when she administered the bezoar?” 

“What?” Aberforth said. He seemed distracted, gazing at his sister. Gull repeated his question. “No, I’m too young to Apparate. Mrs. Eglantine left for the manor once she got the bezoar.”

“What did you do after that?”

“I went home to bury Lionel,” Aberforth said. “I wanted to bury him on the manor grounds but thought that Mrs. Holliwell would get cross with me since that might muck up the flowers growing. So he’s in that spot over there.”

He nodded toward a patch in the ground, recently turned over dirt. There was a clumsy little wooden cross erected on top.

“Then I went back to the manor for questioning once I received Mr. Rozen’s owl,” Aberforth said. “That was when I heard Mr. Holliwell was dead. And that’s it.”

“I see,” Gull said. “What did you think of your employer?”

“I liked his animals,” Aberforth said. “He was friends with Professor Bagshot. Rather generous with his sickles, which helps, since I’m the only one who works in my family.”

There was something irritated in his voice--it did not seem like he meant Ariana, who Aberforth softened around after every mention or glance, and Gull decided that there must be another family member of the Dumbledore household who was the target of Aberforth’s ire. 

Gull thought: This boy is a stable boy, but his manners--his accent--are a trifle polished, although one can tell he’s adopting the local speak. Aberforth was obviously living in poorer circumstances than his upbringing.

What was it Bathilda Bagshot meant about the boy having suffered burdens?

“You’re on good terms with the Holliwell family in general,” Gull observed. “Mr. Emory Holliwell is painting your sister’s portrait,”

“I don’t know anything about art,” Aberforth said. “Ariana likes it. She wants a picture of herself that moves and talks. Mr. Emory said he was looking for a subject and she fits.”

Again, that warmth.

“Thank you,” Gull said. “I think it’s time to talk to him now.”

* * *

 

Of course, they had to wait until Emory Holliwell decided to put down his paintbrush, and he was still absorbed in his work.

While they waited, Gellert mused, “My aunt thinks this Holliwell fellow died by accident. The stable boy thinks it was natural illness. And you Aurors think it was murder, possibly over mythical treasure.”

“It’s not mere ‘thinking’ on our part,” Rozen said, with a sigh. “It was our Healer’s post-mortem diagnostic, though we’re still waiting on the full autopsy. And did you get any--er--flashes of visions or something like that?”

Rozen had no idea how the Inner Eye worked for natural Seers. He hadn’t taken Divination in Hogwarts. It sounded like pure rubbish, tea leaves and crystal balls, and most of the time it was inadmissible in court, but one never knew.

“You’ll see,” Gellert said, with an enigmatic smile.

Seers were always a melodramatic sort, Gull thought.

Emory Holliwell had stopped painting, and he was kneeling over the patch in the ground with Ariana. He said to the girl: “It’s always important to make a monument for the dead.”

He waved his wand, and produced a sturdy little headstone from the crude sticks in place.  _ Lionel,  _ it read.

“Like my mother’s grave,” she said, her head tilted to the side. “I wonder if my father--”

Her face clouded over. Aberforth said, quietly, “Mr. Holliwell, that’s enough.”

“Apologies,” Emory said. He gave Ariana a flicker of a smile and said, “Don’t think about Lionel any more, all right, Ariana? I’ll come back with a little granite figure of Lionel you can leave here. It’ll take me a day or two to sculpt.”

She nodded. “I’d like that.”

Aberforth gently coaxed Ariana away so that the Aurors could question Emory.

“That girl,” Gull murmured. There was something about her, the way she moved and talked...what was the word?  _ Fey? _

“Don’t go bothering Miss Dumbledore,” Emory said sharply, snapping his canvas and palette back inside a case with a burst of magic. “You wanted to talk to me about my father? Jael is the one making funeral arrangements. Give her the body when you’re done with it.”

Callous, careless. Emory Holliwell was not in a traditional period of mourning. 

Emory was a striking man with curly blond hair and dark blue eyes. On the surface, he resembled Gellert Grindelwald, but he had none of the boy’s sharpness in features. It was all softness: the curve of his mouth, the slope of his brow.

“It’s important to examine your late father to determine cause of death, Mr. Holliwell,” Gull said.

“That old fool,” Emory said contemptuously, “did it to himself!”

There was no hesitation in his voice. The declaration fell over them like a judgment.

Rozen said: “You suggest your father took his own life? Suicide?”

And for some reason, that made Emory look amused. “He  _ has _ taken on the reputation of a mad recluse in recent months, hasn’t he? Shutting himself in Eligius and concentrating on his work. Oh, but he was certainly the same in our old home and it only got worse here.”

“You refer to his search for the Eligius treasure.”

“I congratulate you on your sleuthing--what was your name?”

Gull introduced himself.

“Octavius,” Emory said. “Are you an eighth son?”

“I was born in October, Mr. Holliwell.” 

“Names can always be a queer sort of thing,” Emory said. He was abruptly introspective, no longer surly and insolent. “You were named the Muggle way--half-blood, are you? And yet in our world, there are Naming Seers who give children names before they’re born. Give them a name that suits their destiny or a name that they’ll grow their own fate into due to their choices--I don’t know how it’s supposed to work. Messy, isn’t it?

“As an artist, I always have to think the Muggle way, titling my own statues and paintings and drawings, but sometimes I feel like a Seer myself. I’m putting a girl on a portrait who will talk and laugh. She is given the name  _ Ariana Dumbledore  _ like the girl in the flesh. I wonder what will become of that portrait, later.”

“I am a Seer, Mr. Holliwell,” Gellert said, interjecting himself into the haphazard stream of Emory’s musings. “I do not specialise in names, but I have an understanding of what you say about destiny.  _ Die Vorsehung. _ ”

Octavius Gull, who knew some German, thought that the word that Gellert Grindelwald used was closer to  _ Divine Providence  _ than destiny. It was a very Muggle concept, that, but there were always concepts and symbols that crossed over cultures.

Gull allowed Gellert and Emory to exchange talk about divination--Gellert saying that the Eye ran through his family, discussing his grandmother who was a Naming Seer--and finally, he spoke up.

“Mr. Holliwell,” Gull said, “did your father have any enemies? Anything substantial in regard to the Eligius treasure or trouble in society before you moved here? Professional jealousy?”

The conversations about names and seers had cooled Emory’s temper. He said, steadily, “You suspect something more sinister, do you? I stick by my view; his death is on him. The answer to all those questions are no.

“He inherited his galleons from his father, who inherited from his father, who was a well-known Floo powder manufacturer. My father lived comfortably without ever having to do proper work--he’d send off pieces to newspapers, droning on about history and magical innovations.

“He was (I’ll admit) well-respected and well-liked on account of his writings. It wasn’t until Eligius when he set his mind to publishing scholarly work.

“As for the treasure, he didn’t share his findings with us. I doubt he found anything--you talked to Professor Bagshot, didn’t you?--and, Mr. Gull and Mr. Rozen, it bears remembering that Eligius is securely warded.

“The lurking treasure-hungry thief in the night--that wasn’t how my father met his end.”

* * *

 

“I had to send for a curse breaker last night,” Rozen explained. They were still standing in front of the Dumbledore cottage. “We don’t have anyone handy with old wards like Eligius’, and we’ll find out the results this evening. She’s on-site right now.”

“I see,” Gull said. He turned the pieces over in his head. “What do you know about Emory Holliwell?”

“He’s stayed on with his parents since leaving Hogwarts. He’s a typical temperamental artist, as you no doubt observed.”

“Gryffindor?”

“Gryffindor,” Rozen agreed.

“It seems he was at odds with the late Mr. Holliwell,” Gull said. “The wealthy scholarly-inclined father and the dreamy artist son! I suppose he’s been living off the largesse of his father, hasn’t he. Do you know the terms of the will?”

Rozen shook his head. “They’re waiting on their solicitor. We’ll know soon enough. If it was murder, do you think it was him, sir? For inheritance or bad feeling toward his father?”

“He did seem rather insistent that the deceased took his own life,” Gull said thoughtfully. “It’s too early to know, Mr. Rozen.”

There was still more information to gather and more evidence to wait upon.

“What was he doing the night of the murder?” Gull asked.

“Sketching in his room. He said he was shut up there since dinner. One of my Aurors got him out of his room after we arrived on the scene.”

Gull nodded. It was no ironclad alibi at all, but it was to be expected, if the Holliwell family members were scattered in different places in a presumably large mansion.

* * *

 

There was one more significant thing that happened that afternoon by the Dumbledore cottage, before they departed for Eligius.

Gull found Gellert Grindelwald with his head tipped upward, staring at an upstairs window. The boy’s eyes were wide, and there was a faint tint of red on his cheeks.

“Who is that?” Gellert said, softly.

The curtain fluttering--a glimpse of red hair--silver spectacles glinting--and a boy stared down at Gellert, both of them unable to look away--

“Albus Dumbledore,” Rozen said. “Aberforth and Ariana’s older brother.”

Gull did not know why he thought it at the moment, but he remembered:  _ Die Vorsehung. _


End file.
